Chapter 12: Inside Information
For a long time the dwarves stood in the dark before the door and debated, until at last Thorin spoke:
"Now is the time for our esteemed Ms. Summers, who has proved herself a good companion on our long road, and an elf full of courage and resource, and if I may say so possessed of good luck far exceeding the usual allowance—now is the time for her to perform the service for which she was included in our Company; now is the time for her to earn her Reward."
Dawn looked to Legolas. "As it is," he said, "I can't fit without crawling down that tunnel. You will have to bend but just slightly. Besides you did sign a contract did you not? And an Elf's word is his or her bond."
Dawn sighed and nodded and she bent low enough to enter and made her way down the tunnel. As she turned a corner in the tunnel she slipped on the ring. Soon it felt as it was getting warm and she noticed a glow coming from ahead.
Wisps of vapor floated up and past her and she began to perspire as the heat was growing the closer she came to the glow. A sound, too, began to throb in her ears, a sort of bubbling like the noise of a large pot galloping on the fire, mixed with a rumble as of a cat purring. This grew to the unmistakable gurgling noise of some vast animal snoring in its sleep down there in the red glow in front of her.
Dawn came out of the tunnel and before he lay Smaug, fast asleep. She had seen only one dragon before and that was the one that flew out of the portal before she had jumped. To see Smaug now made her slightly tremble with fear. She then saw the mounds of treasure the dragon had horded and remembered what Thorin and the dwarves had asked her to do.
Dawn moved from the shadow of the doorway, across the floor to the nearest edge of the mounds of treasure. She grasped a cup and cast one fearful eye upwards. Smaug stirred a wing, opened a claw, the rumble of his snoring changed its note.
Then Dawn fled. But the dragon did not wake. She proceeded to make her way back outside.
Legolas was overjoyed to see Dawn again. He picked her up and swung her around before they turned to face the dwarves. She presented the cup to the dwarves who smiled.
Suddenly a vast rumbling woke in the mountain underneath as if it was an old volcano that had made up its mind to start eruptions once again. The door behind them was pulled nearly to, and blocked from closing with a stone, but up the long tunnel came the dreadful echoes, from far down in the depths, of a bellowing and a trampling that made the ground beneath them tremble.
They knew Smaug was still to be reckoned with. Then they looked at Dawn and realized what happened. By taking even the cup, Smaug had realized someone had been there. For dragons typically knew how much they had down to the single ounce.
If the dwarves could see the front gate from where they were they would have seen Smaug come out of it, not that they needed see him to know that he was awake and now perched on the side of the mountain looking for the person who had taken the cup. The dwarves crouched against the walls of the ledge cringing under boulders, hoping somehow to escape the frightful eyes of the hunting dragon.
There they would have all been killed, if it had not been for Dawn. "Quick! Quick!" she said. "The door! The tunnel! It's no good here."
Roused by these words they were just about to creep inside the tunnel when Bifur gave a cry: "My cousins! Bombur and Bofur—we have forgotten them, they are down in the valley!"
"They will be slain, and all our ponies too, and all our stores lost," moaned the others. "We can do nothing."
"Nonsense!" said Thorin, recovering his dignity. "We cannot leave them. Get inside Ms. Summers, Legolas, son of Thranduil, Balin and you two Fili and Kili—the dragon shan't have all of us. Now you others where are the ropes? Be quick!"
Dawn, Legolas, Balin, Fili and Kili made their way into the tunnel. The dwarves, including Bombur and Bofur joined them seconds later pulling and dragging in their bundles as Smaug came hurtling from the North, licking the mountain-sides with flame, beating his great wings with a noise like a roaring wind. Then darkness fell as he passed again. The ponies screamed with terror, burst their ropes and galloped wildly off. The dragon swooped and turned to pursue them, and was gone.
"That'll be the end of our poor beasts!" said Thorin. "Nothing can escape Smaug once he sees it. Here we are and here we shall have to stay, unless any one fancies tramping the long open miles back to the river with Smaug on the watch!"
It was not a pleasant thought! They crept further down the tunnel, and there they lay and shivered though it was warm and stuffy, until dawn came pale through the crack of the door.
When morning came the terror of the dwarves grew less. They realized that dangers of this kind were inevitable in dealing with such a guardian, and that it was no good giving up their quest yet. They debated long on what was to be done, but they could think of no way of getting rid of Smaug.
Dawn suggested that she go back down and see if Smaug had returned and what he might be doing. The dwarves agreed, though Legolas had not. At least not till she revealed the existence, to him and the dwarves, of the ring.
When midday came Dawn got ready for another journey down into the Mountain. The sun was shining when she started, but it was as dark as night in the tunnel. The light from the door, almost closed, soon faded as she went down.
Smaug looked fast asleep as Dawn looked at him from the shadow of the tunnel. But asleep he was not. "Well, thief! I smell you and I feel your air. I hear your breath. Come along! Help yourself again, there is plenty and to spare!"
"No thanks," Dawn said as she tried to think of a way out of her new predicament and then smiled. "I did not come for presents. I only wished to have a look at you and see if you were truly as great as tales say. I did not believe them."
"Do you now?" said the dragon somewhat flattered, even though he did not believe a word of it.
"Truly songs and tales fall utterly short of the reality," Dawn replied as she decided to throw caution to the wind and add some more pride to the dragon. "Smaug the Chiefest and Greatest of Calamities."
"You have nice manners for a thief and a liar," said the dragon. "You seem familiar with my name, but I don't seem to remember smelling you before. Who are you and where do you come from, may I ask?"
"Sunnydale, California," Dawn said. "I was not born on your world."
"I see," Smaug said. "I have heard of portals that lead to other worlds. Yet I have never used one myself. Anyways you still have not revealed your name to me."
"For good reason," Dawn said. "For if you knew, then you would know of whom I am. And knowing that you would have power over me for you would know who my family are."
"True," Smaug said. "Quite true. But I know this much. There is but one way you came to get here. From the Lake Town. I haven't been down that way for an age and an age; but I will soon alter that!"
"Very well!" he said aloud. "And I know the horses and ponies I ate were yours as you would not have walked all that way. In return for the excellent meal I will give you one piece of advice for your good: don't have more to do with dwarves than you can help!"
"Dwarves!" said Dawn in pretended surprise.
"Don't talk to me!" said Smaug. "I know the smell (and taste) of dwarf—no one better. Don't tell me that I can eat a dwarf-ridden pony and not know it! You'll come to a bad end, if you go with such friends. I don't mind if you go back and tell them so from me."
"I suppose you got a fair price for that cup?" he went on. "Come now, did you? Nothing at all! Well, that's just like them. And I suppose they are skulking outside, and your job is to do all the dangerous work and get what you can when I'm not looking—for them? And you will get a fair share? Don't you believe it! If you get off alive, you will be lucky."
Dawn smiled. "You don't know everything, Smaug," said he. "Not gold alone brought us here."
"Ha! Ha! You admit the 'us'" laughed Smaug. "Why not say 'us fifteen' and be done with it, elf? Yes I can smell that you are elf but I can also smell you are human as well. Anyways I am pleased to hear that you had other business in these parts besides my gold. In that case you may, perhaps, not altogether waste your time."
"I don't know if it has occurred to you that, even if you could steal the gold bit by bit—a matter of a hundred years or so—you could not get it very far? Not much use on the mountain-side? Not much use in the forest? Bless me! Had you never thought of the catch? A fifteenth share, I suppose, or something like it, those were the terms, eh?"
"Actually fourteenth," Dawn said. "My elf friend was not part of the original party. He joined as my protector and only as that."
"Ah," Smaug said. "Then a fourteenth share. But what about delivery? What about cartage? What about armed guards and tolls?" And Smaug laughed aloud.
"I tell you," Dawn said, "that gold was only an afterthought with us. We came for Revenge. Surely, Smaug, you must realize that your success has made you some bitter enemies?"
Then Smaug really did laugh.
"Revenge!" he snorted, and the light of his eyes lit the hall from floor to ceiling like scarlet lightning. "Revenge! The King under the Mountain is dead and where are his kin that dare seek revenge? Girion Lord of Dale is dead, and I have eaten his people like a wolf among sheep, and where are his sons' sons that dare approach me? I kill where I wish and none dare resist. I laid low the warriors of old and their like is not in the world today. Then I was but young and tender. Now I am old and strong, strong, strong, Thief in the Shadows!" he gloated. "My armor is like tenfold shields, my teeth are swords, my claws spears, the shock of my tail a thunderbolt, my wings a hurricane, and my breath death!"
"I have always understood," said Dawn as she baited the dragon hoping to discover its weakness, which she hoped it might have, "that dragons were softer underneath, especially in the region of the chest; but doubtless one so fortified has thought of that."
The dragon stopped short in his boasting. "Your information is antiquated," he snapped. "I am armored above and below with iron scales and hard gems. No blade can pierce me."
"I might have guessed it," said Dawn. "Truly there can nowhere be found the equal of you. What magnificence to possess a waistcoat of fine diamonds!"
"Yes, it is rare and wonderful, indeed," said Smaug absurdly pleased and rolled over. "Look! What do you say to that?"
"Dazzlingly marvellous! Perfect! Flawless! Staggering!" exclaimed Dawn aloud as she smirked as she spotted it. The way to kill Smaug. There was a large patch in the hollow of the dragon's left breast as bare as a snail out of its shell!
"Well, I really must not detain you any longer," Dawn said, "or keep you from much needed rest. Ponies and horses take some catching, I believe, after a long start." She darted back and fled up the tunnel.
But Smaug had no intention letting Dawn escape. He spouted terrific flames after her, and fast though she sped up the slope, she had not gone nearly far enough to be comfortable before the ghastly head of Smaug was thrust against the opening behind. Luckily the whole head and jaws could not squeeze in, but the nostrils sent forth fire and vapour to pursue her, and she was nearly overcome, and stumbled blindly on in great pain and fear.
The afternoon was turning into evening when Dawn came out again and stumbled and fell in a faint on the 'doorstep'.
Legolas was once at her side as he went to revive her and doctored the burns she had received from Smaug.
The dwarves wanted to know what happened but Dawn did not answer as she looked toward the thrush. It was still there, why?
"I've never seen a bird stay in one spot. Are we near its nesting ground?" Dawn asked.
Thorin nodded. "Thrushes are an ancient breed that used to live about here, tame to the hands of my father and grandfather. They were a long-lived and magical race, and this might even be one of those that were alive then, a couple of hundreds of years or more ago. The Men of Dale used to have the trick of understanding their language, and used them for messengers to fly to the Men of the Lake and elsewhere."
"If that is true," Dawn said. "He must fly now to Lake Town. For Smaug has reasoned we stopped there on our journey. I have a horrible feeling that his next move may be in that direction."
Dawn then told of her conversation with the dragon and even told of what she had learned of its weakness. Then mysteriously the thrust flew off.
"Now, I am sure we are very unsafe here," Dawn said, "Smaug likely can reason just as easy where the other end of this tunnel is. It is very possible that he could collapse this side of the Mountain to bits, if necessary, to stop up our entrance, and if we are smashed with it the better he will like it."
"You are very gloomy, Ms. Summers!" said Thorin. "Why has not Smaug blocked the lower end, then, if he is so eager to keep us out? He has not, or we should have heard him."
"I don't know, I don't know," Dawn said. "There could be any number of reasons. Maybe to entice me back. Maybe so he doesn't damage his bedroom. Regardless of why the possibility still remains that he will find the entrance from this side and make sure that no one else can get in."
The dwarves and Legolas could see in Dawn's eyes that she believed what she said was true. So with some delay they shut the door. Then they moved a slight ways down the tunnel and sat there for a while.
The talk turned to the dragon's wicked words about the dwarves.
"We knew it would be a desperate venture," said Thorin, "and we know that still; and I still think that when we have won it will be time enough to think what to do about it. As for your share, Ms. Summers, I assure you we are more than grateful and you shall choose your own fourteenth, as soon as we have anything to divide."
"That will not be necessary," Dawn said. "I only want a small token to remember the journey. I cannot use the gold below when I return home for our money is different than yours. That said when you find it I ask that you give to Legolas the gems that Smaug had stolen from his people."
"That can be arranged," Thorin said with a nod to Legolas.
From that the talk turned to the great hoard itself and to the things that Thorin and Balin remembered.
"The Arkenstone! The Arkenstone!" murmured Thorin. "It was like a globe with a thousand facets; it shone like silver in the firelight, like water in the sun, like snow under the stars, like rain upon the Moon!"
Legolas nodded as he looked to Dawn. "The Arkenstone, was the sign of the King under the Mountain. If Thorin can find it, it will legitimize his claim."
Just then a blow smote the side of the Mountain like the crash of battering-rams made of forest oaks and swung by giants. The rock boomed, the walls cracked and stones fell from the roof on their heads.
"We're not far enough away," Dawn said. "Move!"
They fled further down the tunnel glad to be still alive, while behind them outside they heard the roar and rumble of Smaug's fury. He was breaking rocks to pieces, smashing wall and cliff with the lashings of his huge tail, till their little lofty camping ground, the scorched grass, the thrush's stone, the snail-covered walls, the narrow ledge, and all disappeared in a jumble of smithereens, and an avalanche of splintered stones fell over the cliff into the valley below.